Transparency levels improve

The Coahuila gov’t received an award from IMCO for achieving 100 percent compliance with the Budget Information Index 2015.

Coahuila The state of Coahuila and its 38 mayors received last week, on behalf of its citizens, an award from the Mexican Institute for Competitiveness (IMCO) for achieving 100 percent compliance with the Budget Information Index from 2015. On behalf of all of Coahuila, Gov. Rubén Moreira Valdez received this award from IMCO National Director Juan Pardinas, who afterwards gave similar awards to the state Supreme Auditing Agency and the 38 state municipalities. The political will of the state government to meet all parameters measured annually by the IMCO have placed Coahuila, along with Puebla and Jalisco, in first place nationally, making the state a national leader in transparency, said Pardinas. In his speech, Moreira Valdez said that the route to fulfill all of the administration’s commitments was planned since the beginning of his administration and following the State Development Plan. This managed to raise the indicators regarding this matter, which previously placed Coahuila at number 30 nationally. “In order to further improve Coahuila, we have taken these indicators as a roadmap and not just as a score. It is something unique that the 38 municipalities and the state government have managed to score 100 percent of what the IMCO determined is a transparent budget,” said Moreira Valdez. The Budget Information Index carried out by the IMCO measures the quality of 413 municipalities and boroughs around the country, through 80 different criteria, in order to eliminate blackout conditions, verify compliance with government accounting and promote good accounting practices. In the 2015 results, of the 48 municipalities that achieved 100 percent, 38 Coahuila municipalities made the list, while the national average only achieved 33 percent. Of the other municipalities that achieved this percentage, eight were in the State of Mexico and two were in Puebla. Juan Pardinas, the general director of the Mexican Institute for Competition, said that what Coahuila has achieved represents one of the greatest events and changes for public politics to improve rivalry between municipalities throughout the whole country. “For what we do, Coahuila has become a national example of what can be achieved with the will and participation of the government and society,” he said. Pardinas said that with good willpower and the faith of the president and the General State Auditor’s Office, like in Coahuila, many things can be done to improve state and municipal finances. For the progress achieved by Coahuila, the General State Auditor’s Office, led by Armando Plata Sandoval, awarded IMCO methodology training to the municipalities of the state, in addition to monitoring its achievement. Thanks to the efforts achieved in 2015, all of the municipalities of the state reached 100 percent, while in 2014, the percentage was 91 and in 2013, the state only achieved 21 percent. In 2016, the IMCO will carry out the Spending Execution Information Index. The municipalities of Abasolo, Arteaga, Francisco I. Madero, Matamoros, Piedras Negras, Ramos Arizpe, Sacramento, San Buenaventura, San Pedro de las Colonias, San Juan de Sabinas and Villa Unión have already agreed to participate. THE NEWS